How to locate important information on a crowded visual display screen is a long-standing problem for the visually impaired who need to use data processing apparatus such as personal computers, special-purpose workstations, operator control panels, and the like.
Today, visually impaired users rely upon screen readers, which convert the content of a display screen to synthesized speech. Typically, a screen reader begins at the upper-left-hand corner of the screen, reading lines from left to right, progressing from the top of the screen to the bottom. Although screen readers enable the visually impaired to comprehend everything on the screen, they are painfully slow, especially when a user is uninterested in, or already familiar with, much of the content of a crowded display screen.
Thus, there is a need to provide visually impaired users with a way to readily locate important information on a crowded display screen, so that they may deal directly with this important information rather than plod through the entire screen using a screen reader.